Monthly Connection September, Howard Roark: The Hero of The Fountainhead

So during the first Socratic Seminar, Katelyn and I had a short discussion regarding whether or not Howard Roark should be considered the hero of The Fountainhead. I believe that he is for numerous reasons, while Katelyn believes that Ellsworth Toohey may be considered the hero to some people.

These two defintions of the word "hero" clearly define Howard Roark, not Ellsworth Toohey.

the principal character in a play or movie or novel or poem
champion: someone who fights for a cause

To start out with, the title of the book is The Fountainhead. This is refering to Howard Roark who, like a fountain, is welling with ideas--particularly about architecture, but these ideas apply to life as well. It would not make sense for an author to title a work after the antagonist(the title of Beowulf is Beowulf, not Grendel.) Ellsworth Toohey, in a sense can be considered a "fountainhead" but not in the terms of the novel. He tried to constantly manipulate people as a way of living. Howard Roark didn't rely on anyone but himself. Usually if a hero is living for others, it is to postively influence their lives, not to control it.

The novel also presented the situation in a way that Howard was the obvious hero. The fact that Toohey is undefeated at the end of the novel takes nothing away from the fact that Howard did succeed. He is the architect he wants to be, he has friends who understand him, and he has Dominique. Especially after learning all of Toohey's true motives, I don't see how any sane person would consider him the hero.

When Toohey gives Peter his big speech about how he intends to control everything, it becomes extremely obvious to the reader that Toohey is the "bad guy." His ideas are similar to that of totalitarian leadership in North Korea. Tell the people what they want because they are too stupid to know, make yourself a God-like figure, basically control everything. This is not the definition of a hero. There isn't a sane person on Earth who wishes to be controlled unless they are brainwashed. So, Toohey would not be considered a hero because his main objective is to control you! Some people may admire the fact that he is smart enough to get all of these people to listen to his ideas, but he cannot be considered a hero because he isn't letting people live.

So tying this in to Beowulf, it would be like calling Grendel the hero. Katelyn's arguement would probably be something along the lines of, if someone didn't like all of the people or the city that Grendel is terrorizing, maybe they would consider Grendel to be the actual hero and maybe even a martyr. This is not the case for the same reasons that make Toohey not the hero of The Fountainhead. To start off with, it is not how the story is presented. Grendel is killing people for no reason, which is very bad. I don't think killing is smiled upon anywhere. Also Grendel is depicted as the villain who the fighting hero like Toohey for Roark.